


Mirror Fragments

by FaustianAspirant



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Drabble Collection, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2011-12-12
Updated: 2011-12-14
Packaged: 2017-10-27 06:16:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 399
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/292537
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FaustianAspirant/pseuds/FaustianAspirant
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Collection of Dave/Karkat double-drabbles.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This one was written before Cascade came out. Could still feasibly apply to canon. Karkat p.o.v.

Dave is less agile than you expected, moving in short, staccato bursts unavoidably reminiscent of faulty machinery: juddering starts, and skittering halts; swift, yet ungainly. It catches you off guard for that brief, anticipatory moment in which you were expecting something flawless. The gloom of the Veil has corroded his mannerisms, rendering sleek motions and seamless quips half dulled, almost hollow. Bruised, like a new shoe slightly scuffed.

Truth be told, you expected to be impressed.

As it is, you have been socked repeatedly in the jaw by the full force of your own misconceptions.

When the inevitable introduction occurs, you expect animosity – gratuitous posturing, followed by quick deliverance from each other’s company. Yet, a few sparrowlike footsteps and he stands before you, expression more sheepish than sardonic, rent ragged by the relentless push, tear and pull of the game’s machinations, and you simply cannot do it.

You cannot hate Dave Strider.

Not when he looks so goddamn _neurotic_.

“Strider,” you mutter, catching him by the shoulder before he lashes out at some imagined flicker of threat. “It’s over, OK?”

Fractionally, he tilts his chin upwards, and you could swear he is actually _looking_ at you.

“… OK,” he says.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And now for something completely different.

Fate, or narcissism? Neither is particularly comfortable with the question. Of all people, how _Dave Strider_ ever became Karkat’s mirror is unfathomable; and it isn’t the reflected facsimile that infuriates him so much as the hairline cracks which, weblike, fringe its surface. They understand each other just enough to wound, and differ just enough to clash. It is the kismetic dance at its most fraught and finely balanced: teetering on the edge of mutual respect; staving off deeper recognition with all the momentum that glancing jibes can afford.

Dave wonders if caring about something _so much_ , to the extent where he would gladly wrap fingers about Karkat’s throat and scrape, not to strangle, but to _hurt_ – wonders if this will actually destroy him. His façade already crumbles at the edges.

Karkat realises that caring _just so, but not enough_ – to the point where the seam between hatred and adoration could not be more visible were it picked out in scarlet thread – will crush him, and has already begun to bruise his ideals.

Neither are particularly attuned to the idea of happiness. But both will gather up the fractured remains of themselves and wield the shards as weapons against one another.


End file.
